One of the weather radars that helps keep an eye on storms approaching southern Wisconsin will go offline beginning Monday, Aug. 24, as the National Weather Service performs maintenance on its La Crosse radar.

The WSR-88D radar, known as KARX, is expected to remain shut down through Sunday, Aug. 30, while crews perform necessary work on the protective dome surrounding the radar antenna. The National Weather Service said the project could take up to a week to complete.

Although New Glarus and Green County are within the National Weather Service Milwaukee/Sullivan forecast area, the La Crosse radar remains an important part of the larger network watching weather across the region. Its location gives meteorologists another look at storms moving through western Wisconsin, southeastern Minnesota and northeastern Iowa before they reach southern Wisconsin.

That can be particularly useful around New Glarus because many storm systems approach the area from the west or northwest. While the Milwaukee/Sullivan radar will continue operating, temporarily losing La Crosse removes one of the upstream views meteorologists can use as storms develop and move east.